Brussels on edge, 2 attackers roam free

Brussels/New Delhi: A grieving Belgium on Thursday hunted two fugitive suspects after bombings that struck at the very heart of Europe, as authorities faced mounting criticism over the country’s worst-ever attacks.

Meanwhile, the last phone call of Infosys employee from Bengaluru Raghavendran Ganesh who has gone missing in Brussels since the deadly terror strike, has been tracked to a metro rail in the Belgian capital, external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj has said.

With growing evidence of links between Tuesday’s bombings and similar attacks that struck France in November, key Paris suspect Salah Abdeslam insisted he was unaware of plans to strike the Belgian capital.

Abdeslam is said to have links to brothers Ibrahim and Khalid El Bakraoui, who carried out suicide attacks on the airport and the metro, with Khalid said to have rented out a flat used by the Paris team and another that was raided in the hunt for Salah. Belgian authorities are now hunting a man with a large bag seen talking to Khalid El Bakraoui on CCTV footage at Maalbeek station, who then did not get on to the train.

A massive manhunt is already under way for a third attacker at Brussels airport, who was seen on security footage with Ibrahim El Bakraoui and a man identified as Najim Laachraoui, but whose bomb did not go off.